In my book which is a study of masculinity and war, the politics of empathy shows how we can get inside soldiers’ experiences of combat and understand what killing or wounding another human being does to the soldiers. The damage goes far beyond the clinical diagnosis of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. It destroys the human spirit.
When we look at leaders who send soldiers to kill and be killed, who know their wars will lead to thousands of deaths which in Iraq has mounted to 1.4 million, and yet those leaders order invasions and surges, we see remorseless human beings who are absent of empathy and in Bush’s case who will lie and con us into going along with their plans. Those are the characteristics of psychopaths, the most hardened of criminals. It is not only his authorization of torture and his lies upon which he based his invasion of Iraq that qualify Bush as a war criminal, it is the psychopathic characteristic of his leadership. Until he is charged with war crimes, we all bear the consequences of his remorseless disregard for human life.
